Travelers walk through the terminal hall at Beijing Capital International Airport, China.
Tingshu Wang | Reuters
The United States plans to raise approx Covid testing requirement for travelers from China introduced earlier this yr, a source accustomed to the matter said on Tuesday.
plan, first reported by The Washington Post, would end China-specific requirements that were implemented in early January.
The US began requiring pre-flight negative Covid tests for travelers aged 2 and over flying from China on January 5. The policy was in step with growth in China’s coronavirus cases after they ended their strict “Covid-zero” policy in December.
NBC News asked the Chinese embassy in Washington for comment on the plan, which comes amid heightened tensions between the 2 countries after suspicious chinese spy balloon toured the USA this yr. The disaster derailed a planned trip to Beijing by Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who could be the primary US Secretary of State to visit China since Mike Pompeo in 2018.
Beijing eased its Covid policy late last yr after weeks nationwide protests over the constraints that had restricted most of day by day life for almost three years. But after the foundations were relaxed, a recent wave of infections quickly followed, prompting the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to announce recent Covid travel rule: Negative test required inside two days before travel for passengers on flights from China, Hong Kong or Macau.
Chinese officials reported on January 14 nearly 60,000 Covid-related deaths from the start of December and guaranteed that the “emergency peak” of its growth had passed. Nevertheless, British analytics firm Airfinity offered something edgier forecast just two days later, predicting that China’s Covid-related death toll had yet to peak and that it might hit 36,000 deaths a day on January 26.
China has been repeatedly accused of underreporting Covid-19 related deaths.
Following the implementation of the Covid policy in January, U.S. officials have seen evidence of cases, hospitalizations and deaths declining in China, sources accustomed to the choice to lift the testing requirement say.
Sources added that U.S. officials will proceed to monitor cases in China and proceed to use a program launched in 2021 to detect recent variants through the voluntary participation of travelers. The so-called program Traveler-based genomic surveillance programcollects nasal swab samples from passengers arriving by air from around 30 countries.
The CDC already requires all air travelers who should not U.S. residents or lawful everlasting residents to be fully vaccinated before arriving within the country.